


Of Cute Library Boys and Sexy Mailmen

by arcadesintheneighbourhood



Category: The Good Place (TV)
Genre: Birthday, Bisexuality, F/M, Libraries, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-07-05 13:21:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15864444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arcadesintheneighbourhood/pseuds/arcadesintheneighbourhood
Summary: Chidi falls for a boy in his ethics class, but he can't bring himself to come to terms with his feelings until he becomes friends with Eleanor Shellstrop. Features a very, very bisexual Chidi.





	Of Cute Library Boys and Sexy Mailmen

Chidi celebrates his eighteenth birthday by heading to the library.

Yes, his birthday’s on a Saturday, and yes, Uzo groaned over the phone when he babbled on and on about his paper on contractualism, but he can’t help it! He’s so excited! He loves the smell of books: the ones freshly pressed with its pages new, the ones with dust on the cover and stains on the spines, the ones he’s visited time and time again like old friends (okay, mostly Kant ones, but still). He can’t wait to dive into the new material he learned this weekend, to break out the new ballpoint pen he bought just for this occasion, and to top it all off, eat the box of snacks his grandmother shipped him in the mail. This birthday was going to be great.

Once he reaches the library, he settles down in his favorite spot by the window and sets up his workflow. His books go right in front of him, his papers go to the right hand side, his pens go- 

“Hey, Chidi?” Chidi swallows as he looks up and catches Peter, the boy who sits across from him in his ethics class, as the inquiring voice. “Can I sit here?” 

Chidi nods silently and returns to his book. God, thank god he had his grandmother’s snacks to calm him down, otherwise he would start having a literal meltdown. He kind of was already. I mean, how was he supposed to focus now that Peter’s leg was brushing against his?

Chidi tries not to let his gaze linger as he flips his book open. He always loved the way Peter sat. He had a straight back and he listened with curious eyes; he stared intently at Chidi during debates and defended him against their arguing classmates and praised him whenever he made a new point. Chidi always bit his lip, blushed, and murmured an inaudible “thank you,” yet he found himself unable to voice his compliments when Peter crafted a shrewd argument with his sharp tongue.

Chidi wonders what he was doing here. Besides the librarian and himself, Peter was the only other one in the reading room, and he chose to sit right next to him. Was he also writing his paper on contractualism? Chidi could ask, he so easily could, but something about Peter that made his throat dry and his tongue twist. Instead, he flicks his eyes towards Peter’s notes, admiring the way he curved his e’s and m’s. 

In class last week, he had edited Chidi’s paper and filled the margins with his loopy script. Chidi had traced over it with his fingers later that night, reveling in the suggestions and flattery Peter offered through the strokes of his pen. On the last page he had written, “You’re a brilliant writer, Chidi. You could write a 4000 paged thesis and I would read it.” Back then, Chidi had ignored the beating of his heart, tried to tuck the rough draft in the back of his desk drawer, but every night since, he fished it out and reread Peter’s comments before slipping into a happy sleep.

“Hey,” Peter nudges his shoulder. Chidi looks up at him. His throat is parched at the meeting of their eyes. “Happy Birthday.”

“Oh! Thanks!” Chidi squeaks. Suddenly, he’s aware of how dorky he sounds, how he keeps shifting in his seat restlessly. He wish he could sink into his skin and hide. “I, um, how did you know?” 

“Wild guess,” Peter smiles and gestures to the note tacked onto the box of his grandma’s snacks. “Are you doing anything special tonight to celebrate?” 

“Uh, nothing planned as of so far!” Chidi fumbles with his pen and drops it on the floor. Oh god, he really was being even more of a nervous idiot than usual. Why couldn’t he just be normal for once? And especially in front of his crush? 

(No, not crush. Definitely not crush. Chidi had meant to think classmate. He wish he could speak normally in front of his classmate) 

“There’s a reading of Baudelaire poems at the cafe downtown,” Peter mentions. The corners of his mouth turn upwards and a twinkle sparkles in his eye. He leans down to pick up Chidi’s pen and holds it out to him. “Do you want to go with me?” 

His eyes are warm and his voice is hopeful and for a split second, Chidi can feel his own eyes shining. He wants so badly to say yes, to sit next to Peter and hold his hand, to rest his head upon Peter’s shoulder and hear the ringing verses of Baudelaire. 

But then something in his body stops him. His stomach lurches. His brain starts grinding like a fork in the garbage disposal. Oh no, oh no, oh no. What was he thinking? He wasn’t brave enough to be with a man- he wasn’t even brave enough to be with a woman. He was racked with indecision and paralyzed by anxiety and he made others around him miserable and he just couldn’t do that to Peter. And wait- what if he was completely wrong? What if Peter wasn’t flirting with him? What if he just wanted to go to the Baudelaire reading as friends? What if Peter thought he was a freak for being so nervous around him? Was Chidi a freak? Was it even normal to want to be with both guys and girls? Did anyone else feel this way?

Oh no, he was spiraling. He was in the library, his only safe place, and he felt like he had to throw up. He needed to get out of here. He needed to get of here, he needed to get out of- 

“Um, well actually, I have to go!” Chidi cries before he can register the panic in his own voice. He collects his supplies quickly, too quickly, just so he can’t embarrass himself even more than he already has. “I have to, um, feed my cat! I’ll um, see you in class! Maybe!” 

Without turning around, Chidi already knows the fallen look on Peter’s face. 

And he can’t say he doesn’t agonize about it for the next seventeen years. 

******* 

Chidi’s first smile on his thirty fifth birthday is from the aroma of plaintain chips and the sight of Eleanor Shellstrop.

“Hey, man,” Eleanor greets. She’s standing in front of her bedroom ledge with her eyes bright and her smile wide. “Happy Birthday!”

“Hey!” Chidi greets. He’s still grinning as he walks over to the “Happy Birthday, Chidi” sign over the entryway to her bedroom. She’s wearing a light blue shirt that matches her eyes and is carrying a basket full of his favorite things: French poetry and good wine and his grandmother’s favorite snacks, a bowl of maafe and a stack of Kant books and a carton of almond milk. His heart flips in his chest as his eyes roam around and notice the decorations strewn across the walls. “I didn’t expect to see you up so early.” 

“Come on, nerd,” Eleanor teases with a playful raise of the eyebrows. “You didn’t think I’d forget your birthday, did you?” 

“Hi, Eleanor!” Janet pops in. “Here’s that sexy mailman photo you wanted as part of your last minute gifts for Chidi’s birthday. Let me know if you need anything else! Bye!”

Janet pops out. Chidi tilts his head at Eleanor. She’s biting her lip guiltily, hoping that maybe, somehow, Chidi didn’t notice.

“Fine, fine, so I had a little help,” Eleanor reluctantly admits, making Chidi duck down his head and laugh. 

“Still, it’s impressive that you put this all together.” He glances down at the sexy mailman photo beside Eleanor and begins to finger the canvas. “So, um, the sexy mailman?” 

“Oh, yeah. I asked for that a few days ago when Janet was still glitching,” Eleanor explains with a flick of the hand. “She must’ve gotten your wish list messed up with my request. Don’t worry, I’ll take it out of your way.” 

“Actually…” Chidi hesitates. He licks his lips nervously and continues staring at the photo. He’d actually wanted a poster just like Eleanor ever since she hung hers. He liked staring at the mailman’s warm eyes, the chiseled portion of his body, but he’d been too sheepish to ever tell Eleanor. He didn’t know why he was so afraid to confide in her- he knew she wouldn’t judge him. She was always talking about how hot Tahani was, and how much she liked girls with cute smiles, and the past ex-girlfriends whose wallets she totally did not steal from. 

(Her words, not Chidi’s) 

But at the same time… Chidi had never told anyone. Anyone. Not Henry, not Femi. Not even Uzo. Telling Eleanor would suddenly make it real, and he didn’t know if he was able to handle that kind of change in himself. He wasn’t even able to handle putting socks on in the morning. 

But Eleanor asks, “Actually, what, Chidi?” And her voice is so light and sweet it draws Chidi’s eyes back up to hers. She’s watching him patiently, waiting for him for once instead of filling the silence with stories of herself. Chidi can’t help but soften at her gaze. She knows him well enough to stay quiet during this moment, that he needs time to work up the emotional energy to tell her what he was thinking. And maybe it was because she was changing in order to treat him more gently, and maybe it was because this was the closest he’d ever felt to another person in his life, but Chidi finds it in himself to stammer out a confession.

“I- I- I- um, I like the mailmen,” He mumbles. Chidi suddenly rediscovers his interest in the floor. “I- um, really, really like them.” 

He wishes he was able to say more. He wants to tell her about the first time Peter looked at him and he knew, how he had been asked him out in the library and he ran away, how, years later, he realized that a poetry reading definitely was a romantic date and he cursed himself for not going. 

But he just can’t make himself say everything yet. Soon, but not yet. 

Eleanor knows. She doesn’t push him; she simply wraps her hand around his instead. He looks up at her. Her eyes are gentle while his shake. 

“Hey, Chidi,” She says, kind and understanding and uncharacteristically soft. “You realize that’s amazing, right? Now we can replace all these clown paintings.” 

Chidi laughs and tightens his grip around her hand. He squeezes it. Eleanor runs his thumb along his knuckles. She squeezes back. 

“Come on, now.” Eleanor pulls him gently towards his bedroom. Chidi lets her lead him, her hand still woven in his. “Let’s go hang this photo up in your room, birthday boy.”


End file.
